After the auspicious stepping-down of former tan mom/emotional dad John Boehner, and the subsequent withdrawal of speaker candidate Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the Republican party is at a loss, grasping for straws — or anyone who will volunteer to lead the party. Meanwhile, the Democrats are having a jolly good laugh at the whole thing, seizing the golden opportunity to seem “personable” — not in calculated way.

Earlier today, a man learned the hard way that, no matter how funny your joke might be, it's never a good idea to make it if it's subject is dynamite and you're in an airport. When a TACA Airlines agent asked Alejandro Hurtado if he was carrying any hazardous materials, Hurtado joked that he packed dynamite in his luggage.

Chief U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull has admitted to sending a mass email joking that Barack Obama is black because his mother slept around so much, she even had sex with a dog. Cebull swears he's not a racist, though.

UConn, America's foremost institution of sports riots and male rage, is in uproar after student-run (and student-funded) television network UCTV aired a sketch comedy segment that depicted a crying girl using a blue-light phone while fleeing a possible rapist. As she attempts to escape, the robotic blue-light voices call her a "cock gobbler," a "stinky bitchy," a "blonde bitch," and a "howler monkey bitch" who is "crying rape." The sketch ends with the girl falling to the ground after her attacker strangles her in a dark parking lot.

While discussing Amy Winehouse's recent disaster concert in Belgrade on her E! public access talk show, comedian Chelsea Handler, and her panelists, said some offensive things about Serbia and its people, and those people are now angry.

The voice behind the unequivocally irritating Aflac duck, Gilbert Gottfried, has been canned by the insurance company following a series of ill-advised jokes he tweeted (quacked?) about Japan this weekend.

The BBC has apologized for an episode of the quiz show QI last month about the "unluckiest man in the world," Tsutomu Yamaguchi, who survived both atomic bomb attacks on Japan. The jokes didn't go over so well in Japan.

Sen. David Vitter's unforced lady-related issues continue! The Louisianan, who had affairs with prostitutes and employed a "women's issues" aide who knifed women, joked on the radio today about how Rachel Maddow looks like a dude. Yes, he's apologizing.

You know what's a funny joke to make about photos of Sen. Scott Brown with his attractive daughters? That the daughters are his "prostitutes." Give Kathy Griffin credit for this very creative joke! Scott Brown doesn't get it, though.

"Anime is a prime example that two nukes just wasn't enough," NH State Rep. Nick Levasseur said on Facebook. Now he is apologizing for the statement, which "could be deemed as insensitive to Japanese culture," according to the local news.

A New York Times blog drags out and beats to death a joke about which presidential candidate Alex P. Keaton, the lovable Republican youngster played by Michael J. Fox on the 80's sitcom Family Ties, would be supporting today. Sigh. [NYT]